The present invention relates to a recording/reproducing device for audio-visual data transferred via a network or the like, and particularly to an improvement with which audio-visual data can be transferred between recording/reproducing devices or the like at high speeds.
With the recent start of digital television broadcasting, appliances such as BS digital tuners and televisions including these tuners are coming into widespread use. In addition, digital audio-visual data recording/reproducing devices (hard disk recorders) for recording audio visual (AV) data of broadcasted programs and the like are also being used.
The above-described digital audio-visual data recording/reproducing device is connected to a device such as a tuner by means of, for example, a bus based on the IEEE 1394 standard, and isochronous transfer (synchronous transfer) is used such that the transfer, recording, reproduction, display and the like of AV data (AV stream data) can be performed with an appropriate timing in which temporal continuity is ensured.
In the case of transferring AV data by synchronous transfer as described above, however, the transfer always requires the same actual time as in the case where an actual displaying is performed, although temporal continuity is ensured. Therefore, it takes one hour to duplicate or transport, for example, one hour of AV data between recording/reproducing devices, regardless of the transfer capability and the like of the bus.